That said, however stuffed as the boxes might have been there wasn't a shortage of troops, supplies, or officers willing to back that choice. If the fix was in, it was a popular fix all same.

There were constant shortages of troops and supplies in the south. All they really had going for them were their generals.

I had an history professor that maintained that at least two of the Confederate states had more volunteers in the Army of the Republic than they did in the Confederate army.

Not total number of soldiers, mind, simply the volunteers.

That there was that great a separation between the the leadership of those states and the hard scrabble farmers and miners that made up the majority of their populations. It was the monied land owners that wanted secession and the right to own other human beings as property.

The professor was from South Carolina, and was of the opinion that Lee should have been hanged, not for the war, but for continuing the war far past the point where the South had no chance of victory.

Revisionist history is a tempting fruit, but one best avoided.

As for whether the South would have been allowed to secede, had they not fired on Fort Sumter... I kind of doubt it, but a small island off of the coast of Maine did de facto secede just a bit before the Civil War - an act not officially recognized by the US government, but recognized by the US Post Office, the Treasury Department (including the Coast Guard), and the draft boards.

Wiscongus remained separate from the US until WWII.... (A patriotic surge because of the war and an aging Postmaster led to the island rejoining the Union.)

Mind you, we are talking about maybe a couple of hundred people here.... Easy enough to ignore.

The Auld Grump - the one attempt by the draft boards to conscript soldiers during the Civil War was driven off by the wives of Wiscongous throwing hot potatoes at the soldiers....

Close. So, very close. But I'm thinking more Greek letters and fewer inhibitions.

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I was once almost jumped for trying to open the back door to a frat house and deliver pizza. Apparently, the super-secret initiation was going on in the basement and they thought I was spying. When I pulled out the pizza and gave them the second year's name the anger didn't evaporate, it was just transferred to the second year.

Carefully about generalizing and stereotyping.

While some, heck a lot, live down to it most frat life is pretty much your standard college experience with more bills and an assumption of guilt by administration.

Ian HomeyardAlpha Phi Rho - Omega Phi, Spring 1998

I have a gay friend that, due to a lack of dorm space, ended up being sent to a frat dorm, despite not being a member of the fraternity.

Despite the fertile ground for inane hijinks he had no problems at all.

By his description, they bent over backwards not to make him uncomfortable.

But that when they hooked him up with blind dates they had lousy taste in men. (Actually, he claimed that they had shown the same taste in choosing boyfriends for him that they showed in picking up girls for themselves. 'This guy's gay, Chris is gay, maybe they'll be friends...')

Folks have learned not to make frat jokes around him.

The Auld Grump - he was a gay accounting student in a frat of jocks.... The gods of farce must have blinked....

On Tuesday I ran the first pure, modern Spycraft game that I have run in years, and had a blast with a scene where one of the PCs got nabbed.

Our hero's world fades to black as he is alone in an elevator.

When he awkes he is strapped to a tilted table, in a room with metal walls.

A few minutes later the one door in the room opens, and in comes a blond man with a dueling scar, dressed in thigh high boots, a corset, shorts, and carrying a riding quirt.

He strikes the agent once across the belly with the quirt, at which point our hero realizes that he has been stripped before being strapped to the table.

Then the man begins to speak....

'Before we begin, Mr. Babbage, I need to know your safeword.''Safeword?''Ah, new to this, are you?...Choose a word, easy to remember, quick to say. As soon as you say it, I stop my ministrations, and raise my hands, like this'*Demonstrates*'So that you know that I have heard you.'

While I am the one with the lash, you are the one in control.

If you feel dizzy, or short of breath, use the safeword immediately - do not try to brave it out. A panic attack can ruin the experience for both of us.

If you check the cuffs that are securing you to the table you will find a latch that you can reach even with your hands cuffed - it is difficult to reach, if you have a problem reaching it then use the safeword, and I will release you immediately....'

It was about then that our hero realized that there was a camera recording the proceedings....

Fortunately for him, the 'torturer' wasn't part of of the enemy agency, and that the nabbing had been done by one of his allies....

I stole the monologue pretty much entirely from a description of a bondage session...* I had been amused at how reassuring the dominator had been in describing what was going on. And his telling the 'victim' that they were the one in control - that with a word they could stop the whole thing, and that if they were worried they should just stop it immediately.

I then wondered how an Agent might handle the situation, as they realized that what was going on wasn't quite what it appeared to be.

The player managed to both talk his way out of the situation, and have the credit put into a gift certificate for a later date....

There was a fair amount laughter at the table....

The Auld Grump

* Webcomics can lead to strange places... in this case Devil's Panties led to Jenny Everywhere, that led to another webcomic titled Nic Buxom - A webcomic drawn and written by a heavy bottom. Which led to more information than I wanted, actually.... But found useful.